Silence and the Word
Negative Theology and Incarnation
Published on 1. August 2002
Book
Hardback
240 pages
978-0-521-81718-9 (ISBN)
Description
Negative theology or apophasis - the idea that God is best identified in terms of 'absence', 'otherness', 'difference' - has been influential in modern Christian thought, resonating as it does with secular notions of negation developed in continental philosophy. Apophasis also has a strong intellectual history dating back to the early Church Fathers. Silence and the Word both studies the history of apophasis and examines its relationship with contemporary secular philosophy. Leading Christian thinkers explore in their own way the extent to which the concept of the apophatic illumines some of the deepest doctrinal structures of Christian faith, and of Christian self-understanding both in terms of its historical and contemporary situatedness, showing how a dimension of negativity has characterised not only traditional mysticism but most forms of Christian thought over the years.
Reviews / Votes
"[Davies and Turner's] contributions helpfully suggest ways in which the doctrines of the trinity and the incarnation, far from subverting negative theology, provide the conceptual framework within which Christians become most fully aware of language's inability to encompass or exhaust divinity." Religious Studies Review "Almost every essay in this fine collection is worth reading, and some are worth intense study. Kudos to Davies and Turner for compiling a collection that shows that living into God means not dogmatic triumphalism but patient humility before the plenitude of a mystery of love that is always before us and behind us, holding us but never allowing us to kill her by holding too tightly to her with our merely human concepts." Modern Theology "In terms of writing, intellectual penetration, and coverage of a topic, this is in every way a superior collection." - Cyril O'Regan, The University of Notre DameMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
Cambridge
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 235 mm
Width: 157 mm
Thickness: 19 mm
Weight
546 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-521-81718-9 (9780521817189)
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Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
01/2005
1st Edition
Cambridge University Press
€38.49
Available for download
Persons
Oliver Davies is Reader in Philosophical Theology in the University of Wales and has written a number of studies of Christian mystical writers, including Meister Eckhart: Mystical Theologian (SPCK 1991). The first volume of his Systematic Theology in three parts appeared as A Theology of Compassion (SCM Press 2001), and the second volume, On the Creativity of God, is currently under preparation. Denys Turner is the Norris-Hulse Professor of Philosophical Theology at the University of Cambridge and former H. G.Wood Professor at the University of Birmingham. He is the author of On the Philosophy of Karl Marx (Sceptre, 1969), Marxism and Christianity (Blackwell, 1983) and The Darkness of God (CUP, 1995). He is currently working on a book on Thomas Aquinas and the doctrine of God.
Content
Preface; Notes on contributors; Introduction Oliver Davies and Denys Turner; 1. Apophaticism, idolatory and the claims of reason Denys Turner; 2. The quest for a place which is 'not-a-place': the hiddenness of God and the presence of God Paul S. Fiddes; 3. The gift of the name: Moses and the burning bush Janet Martin Soskice; 4. Aquinas on the Trinity Herbert McCabe; 5. Vere tu es deus absconditus: the hidden God in Luther and some mystics Bernard McGinn; 6. The deflections of desire: negative theology in Trinitarian disclosure Rowan Williams; 7. The formation of mind: Trinity and understanding in Newman Mark A. McIntosh; 8. 'In the daylight forever?': language and silence Graham Ward; 9. Apophasis and the Shoah: where was Jesus Christ at Auschwitz? David F. Ford; 10. Soundings: towards a theological poetics of silence Oliver Davies; Select bibliography.